Gazette: Anniversaries

Births: Samuel Dircksz van Hoogstraten, painter, 1627; Gerard Audran, artist and engraver, 1640; Joseph John Gurney, philanthropist, 1788; Nicholas Patrick Stephen Wiseman, Cardinal, first archbishop of Westminster, 1802; John Tyndall, physicist, 1820; Edward Augustus Freeman, historian, 1823; Julius Schulhoff, organist and composer, 1825; Henry Steel Olcott, co- founder of the Theosophical Society, 1832; Elisha Gray, an inventor of the telephone, 1835; Francis Marion Crawford, novelist, 1854; Ernest Christopher Dowson, poet, 1867; Ethel Mary Dell (Mrs G.T. Savage), novelist, 1881; Sir Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss, composer, 1891; Leslie Lincoln Henson, actor-manager, 1891; Myrna Loy (Katerina Myrna Williams), actress, 1905.

Deaths: King William II (William Rufus), shot in the New Forest, 1100; Thomas Gainsborough, painter, 1788; Jacques-Etienne Montgolfier, balloonist, 1799; Mehemet Ali, Viceroy of Egypt, 1849; "Wild Bill" Hickok (James Butler), western Marshal, shot dead, 1876; Marcus Andrew Hislop Clarke, author, 1881; Enrico Caruso, operatic tenor, 1921; Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, 1922; Warren Gamaliel Harding, 29th president of the United States, 1923; Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg, soldier and statesman, 1934; Louis Bleriot, aviator, 1936; Pietro Mascagni, composer, 1945; Wallace Stevens, poet, 1955; Fritz Lang, film director, 1976; Carlos Chavez, composer, 1978.

On this day: the Quadruple Alliance between Britain, France, Austria and Holland against Spain was concluded in London, 1718; the newly-opened Theatre Royal in York staged a performance of Henry V, 1744; Napoleon was declared "Consul for life", 1802; the government of India was transferred from the East India Company to the Crown, 1858; British Columbia became a Crown Colony, 1858; the transatlantic cable, being laid by the Great Eastern, snapped and was lost, 1865; death duties first introduced, 1894; Russian troops invaded East Prussia, 1914; the Potsdam Conference ended, 1945; Iraqi tanks and infantry invaded and occupied Kuwait, 1990.

Today is the Feast Day of St Eusebius of Vercelli, St Plegmund, archbishop of Canterbury, St Sidwell or Sativola, St Stephen I, Pope, St Syagrius of Autun and St Theodota and her Three Sons.